Say That You Love Me
by Theanimekitty89
Summary: The way to a man's heart goes through his stomach, right? April O'Neil tries to bake the perfect batch of chocolate to Donnie after an advice from Alex, but somehow things don't go exactly as she'd planned. Example; when did the other turtles suddenly fall in love with her? And why's Donnie acting so cold towards her? This certainly isn't your everyday Valentine's Day, folks. R
1. The Approach

**A/N: Hello again everyone! :D Another idea, another story ;w; This one will only contain a few chapters, tho. Enjoy!**

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**Valentine's Day: The Approach.**

14th of February. The date of the most romantic day ever known to mankind, where confessions will be said, cards, flowers and sweets will be exchanged and hearts will either melt or break. For some, it's a day to spend with your beloved, whether it's a really good friend, a family member or a lover. For others, it was just a dreaded reminder of how single you were, but some tended not to think of it too much and just hang out with some of their closest anyway. Stores would be decorated with crimson red and deep pink colours, hanging up hearts and others to prepare for the day and to bring every costumer in a loving mood. Yes, Valentine's was a day that not many forgot about.

_Sigh._

For one girl in particular, it was mostly hurtful to know that not even on _that _day, you'd be able to tell your crush just how you truly felt about them. Propped comfortably on a couch in the living room of her Aunt, a young girl sat with slightly curled red hair, azure blue eyes and a few tiny freckles dusted across her delicate face. Her fingers were entwined and resting above her belly, her eyes closed deep in thought. She wished for something to do today with school being closed; the majority of the students went to town to engage in some love-carnival that were open in favour of said holiday and to be honest, she didn't have the nerves to go as well. She'd most likely watch couples happily in love everywhere and be reminded of how she wasn't with anyone whom she liked, so better to spare herself the awkwardness.

No, April didn't like any guys at her school. Most were immature of their age, some few held a decent gentlemen's behaviour towards other girls but were just plain unattractive and the rest were a little too boring for her taste. She had been turning down one or two students who'd put a card in her locker during school and some had been asking her what she'd be doing later today, to which she politely declined any possible plans of theirs. She was flattered really, but she held no interest in none and so she wouldn't try to give them false hope of pursuing anything but mere friendship from her.

_Oh, okay. That's cool. Is it because you're already dating someone you like?_

Oh, she only wished.

If she could actually find a single reason to spend any time with _him_ this particular day without having to buy his brothers' pizza or explaining how her laptop _inconveniently_ stood too close to the edge of her bed and broke its screen only to watch him fix it expertly, she'd be more than grateful. If they could spend time in a romantically way instead of finding a plausible excuse each time, it'd be about the best Valentine's gift she could get from anyone. Though, she was too much of a coward when it came to drop hints about her crush, how would she ever pull it off? Groaning softly, she rolled her head to the side of the cushion her head was resting on.

_Donatello._

She had fallen for him, that much was obvious and the reasons that followed were obvious as well. He was also so gentle with her, but never doubted her skills in a battle and never thought she couldn't take care of her; he always had her back when she was in trouble. He was always there as a great friend when she needed it; when she was having stress from either school or upset from the absence of her Dad, he would be there with a soothing smile, comforting words or a hug that could make all her sadness ebb away just like that.

He always made an effort to make her smile, even if it meant making a fool of himself – which he usually did – but it was rarely that anyone would go that far just to make her feel better, so it touched her heart of how thoughtful and caring he was. And she'd be lying if she said that his intelligence didn't fascinate her; all of his invention marvelled her first time she stepped into his lab and saw how blueprints and sketches dominated the walls as well as his tools and how several of different chemicals filled the space of his desks. Personally, she thought she could listen to saying all sorts of smart stuff and long words because the redhead was lost deep within the depths of his unique chestnut-brown eyes and his low and hushed voice…

Pressing her face down upon the couch pillow to hide her heated face, April grasped tightly at its ends in frustration. She'd never be able to tell him. She'd probably go by thousands of Valentine's Days and would never have the gut to tell him. How ironic.

Footsteps were heard through the house and April looked up with curious eyes. "Auntie, you're back from town already?"

"_Yes, dear April, you're incredibly hot Auntie is back_!"

The redhead's eyebrows disappeared into her hairline as the all but familiar Alex stepped through the door-frame, her backpack slung over one shoulder while a hand waved a salute.

"Yo."

"''_Yo_' yourself; how did you come in?" the redhead demanded to know, sliding into a sitting position on the couch. The dark-haired girl waved a hand at her dismissively.

"Man, I come in here so often that your Aunt just gave me a spare-key to save herself the trouble of me busting in here myself. Smart lady."

"So I've heard," April replied dryly. "Commonly said about us O'Neil women."

Alex plopped down right beside her and started roaming her hand through the stuff in her backpack, taking out small bags of chocolate. "Girl, where _were _you? I was gathering this stuff _all _by myself because you never came!"

"I don't recall us ever making any agreements for today," April replied, offended.

"Sure we did! At lunch, remember? I distinctly remember saying; 'Ape, today we're going to town to get ourselves free chocolate and maybe even scam some suckers into thinking we're a lesbian couple," the girl explained. "And you said 'meh.'"

"And you actually thought I'd agree to any of that," the redhead rolled her eyes. "Your mistake, not mine."

"Fine, then," Alex gathered all the bags into her embrace. "Was gonna give you some anyway, but you obviously ain't sorry, so none for you. _Your_ mistake, not mine."

At the obvious lack of response from her redheaded friend, Alex raised a brow as she opened a small bag of candy. "Oi, what's the matter?"

"Donnie's never going to like me," came the sad reply. "I can't even ask him to hang out on V-day."

The other girl was speechless for a moment, putting a small circular piece of chocolate into her mouth and chewing. "Huh. So, that's why you didn't come."

"I just want to be alone," April said, curling into a ball. Alex patted her head mockingly. "C'mon, it ain't that bad. You just need to say three simple words and he'll be yours."

The redhead sniffed, glancing up at the dark-haired girl. "Use a tissue?" she chuckled dryly, motioning towards Alex' face that had chocolate smeared at the corners of her mouth.

The girl glared her down, wiping her mouth. "No, _screw you, Ape._ Quit changing the subject, I'm serious."

The redhead looked away, uneasy. "But you make it sound so easy. I can't just waltz over and just…say that I like him. What if it backfires?"

Alex pondered over this, playing around with two other small pieces of candy. As she put another into her mouth, her gaze lingered on it for a minute…before finally eating it. "Well…how about you make him some home-made chocolate, then?"

"What?" April glanced away from her hands and looked at her best friend. Alex dug into her backpack once more, coming out with a small note-book sized book.

"Yeah. I read into this book a while ago and it says that in Japan, it's customary that the girl hands a small gift in the form of chocolate or something else to the boy she likes. Homemade chocolate is usually most popular in their culture. I mean, think about it. The guys are (sorta) Japanese," the dark-haired girl placed both her hands one way, April's eyes lingered on her the entire time.

"…and Donnie's (definitely) a guy," she placed her hands the opposite way, snapping her fingers in triumph. "This has got to be. The. Best. Plan. _Evah_. You'll see; you and Donatello will be feeding each other small bites of awesome chocolate-coated, marshmallow-stuffed love before _you know it_."

Alex spread out her arms, smirking proudly at herself. "C'mon, gotta give me credits for this one."

The redhead blinked owlishly at her friend before a smile grazed her lips, a finger coming up to rest on her chin in thought. "Hmmm. That might work. Would you…help me make it?"

"If I can lick the spoon after you've stirred it, then I'm yours~," Alex replied cheerfully, shaking her now empty bag first bag, reaching her hand out to grab another. April unexpectedly reached out as well and hugged her friend in gratitude, looking happier than when Alex first came in.

"I can't wait till Donnie sees it," she giggled. "Thanks."

"Uh…don't mention it."

And as the redhead went to heat up the oven, Alex couldn't help but be a little guilty. After all, April would be quite pissed if she ever found out that she'd gotten that idea from a Japanese manga volume.

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**A/N: owo**

**It's a start at the very least~**

**R&R, my babies. **


	2. The Cooking

**A/N: Glad to know that some have taken interest in this little Valentine's story xD And the positive comments about Alex; I honestly thought I was going a bit too far back in the first chapter –w- Apparently not~**

**Some chapters tend to be smaller than other (this one might be) Since the story itself isn't very long, I think I can get away with that.**

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**Valentine's Day: The Cooking.**

"Oh, right. We can't bake the chocolate here."

The dark-haired girl – who had oh-so-discreetly hidden the manga volume in her bag – glanced anywhere but _near _it when the redhead had spoken out of the blue. She raised a brow questionably as a prompt for further explanation. You tended to be a little _incapable _of speaking properly when your mouth was full of melted chocolate.

"My Aunt will be back soon and if she finds out, she'll bomb me with questions about who I like," the teen deadpanned, fists clenching in frantic thinking. "She's way too clever for me to trick _that _easily. Let's do it at your place."

"_Nuh-uh_," Alex disagreed with a shake of her head. "Can't do."

"Why not?" April frowned as she crossed her arms.

"I'm not sure I'd make it," she replied frankly, motioned to her belly. "Should've known not to eat the last one."

"Because nine bags of chocolate makes that much of a difference from ten."

"Amazingly, it does," the dark-haired girl shrugged, curling up comfortably on the couch. "_Gawd_, April, let me marry your couch."

"Alexander, you can't just bail on me _already_; you gave me the idea like three minutes ago!" April grabbed hold of one of Alex' hands and attempted to drag her off the couch. "Besides, I thought the reason why you agreed to help me was to make some sweets of your own. After all, we're _all_ painfully aware that you have a thing for R-."

"Don't bring up that which shan't be spoken of!" Alex exclaimed loudly, gone from the furniture in an instant and covering the redhead's mouth, effectively shutting her up. The red-haired girl lowered her eye-lids lazily in slight annoyance but kept her mouth closed nevertheless.

"Fine, we'll go. Fortunately, my sisters might've gone to town for the afternoon," the other teen asked hesitantly, her face slight red as she asked the question. Prying off the other's hand from her mouth in order to speak, April replied rather calmly though with a hint of amusement; "And if they come back early?"

"Tch. I'll just barricade the front-door. Always works, so I don't see no reason for it to fail now."

Soon the two girls had reached the Taylor apartment and entered the three sisters' home. One went to the small kitchen to prepare the essential ingredients as well as preparing the pots and oven, whilst the other browsed the several of cooking sites for diverse recipes. They agreed on finding a basic recipe that they wouldn't have any trouble making and then they could add something extra and decorate after their creativity.

"Here's a spare apron, Ape."

The redhead deadpanned as she was handed a small, pink apron with frills along the sides. Glaring suspiciously at her friend, April certainly didn't approve of this joke.

"That's _awfully_ nice of you."

"I _knew_ you'd like it."

"And…you're sure that it's the last one you have."

"Absolutely. Pfft, we could send Donnie a pic of you in nothing but _that _thing and we wouldn't even need no chocolate. _Whoo_; Happy Valentine's Day to the brains of the bunch!"

April put on the pink apron with a slight look of disapproval. "Are you done?"

"Far from it," Alex snickered. "_but _we need to get to work at some point, I guess."

"Right," the redhead nodded. "Let's get on with it."

To say that_ it didn't go very well_ would be an understatement. To say that _they nearly didn't catch fire on themselves_ would be a lie. Some basic techniques shown on the internet would be screwed with, some of the ingredients would be wrongly measured, some of the steps would just plainly be skipped, there was slight yelling involved, and a lot of smoke, to put it frankly. The kitchen was basically coated in lots of flour, milk and cacao powder, some of the batter laid as spots on various places such as on the girls themselves. They both looked pretty tired not mention _stressed out_, their teamwork on the fighting ground outside were far much better than their coordination in a kitchen. Currently, April was stirring some of the smooth chocolate batter in a bowl as she wiped some flour off her the bridge of her nose. Alex had prepared the tin-plate for the chocolate to bake on and had gone off to find some cleaning materials to make the kitchen-area look less as if somebody had had a food fight.

The half-mutant began to find many more spots from where chocolate were sitting and huffed angrily as the dark-haired girl returned with a mob and a bucket of soapy water.

"_Well_," she commented, leaning up against the mob. "Would you kick me six days from Sunday if I told that Donnie would practically eat you up if he saw you now?"

"Probably," the redhead replied, a red hue taking place upon her freckle-dusted cheeks. Gazing around the kitchen, she sighed in surrender, her arms hanging tiredly at her sides. "Oh, this is a _disaster_," she covered her face with her hands. "What makes you think that this will be any good?"

"'Cause you made it with _love_-," she was rewarded with a hard stare. "Sorry, yeah, wrong phrase. But look on the bright side!"

"What bright side?" April asked.

"If we screw this up, we could always make up a song. I mean, songs can be romantic too, right?"

"Only if it's the guy who makes the song," the redhead corrected. "And sings it to the girl."

"You gotta think out of the box, Ape, this is the 21st century; anything is possible. I was thinking along the lines of:

_Oh, Donnie, you're so fine_

_You're so fine, you blow my mind_

_Hey, Donnie,_

_I think you're really, really, sssssss-_

Upon receiving an ever more painful stare than the previous, Alex decided that she was too young to die even if finishing the sentence would sort of, maybe be worth it.

"ssssssssmart. Smart, that's the word."

"That doesn't rhyme with 'Donnie'."

"Let's put the songs away as a possible alternative if the candy-idea goes wrong, hmm?"

Someone was trying to avoid a certain subject.

"Sounds great," April replied, a tad more darkly than her friend would've preferred. Before trying to fill up the holes in the plate with the chocolate, April gasped in realization and ran a hand through her red locks. "Wait, I forgot the Vanilla sugar."

"It's chocolate," Alex deadpanned. "M'pretty sure it wouldn't taste Vanilla either way."

"Yeah, but just a bit won't hurt," the half-mutant replied, searching shelves to find the desired ingredient. "Hopefully, you have some, right?"

"If you can't find it, then it ain't there," the other girl shrugged as the redhead continued to search but with no results. "And I know for sure we don't have any back home."

"Maybe we can borrow some sugar at the guys' place."

April chuckled. "I'm not sure that's very likely, Alex."

"We've been buying stuff for them all the time, for _their _food-supply," Alex pointed out. "And don't forget Mikey likes to cook and bake. I'm sure they might have some. And there's a manhole cover at an alley not far away from here; it'll take like fifteen minutes to grab it and return home."

April seemed to think this over for a while. "Sure. Would you mind getting it? I seriously need a small break," she sighed in relief as she sat down on a nearby chair. "Fifteen minutes doesn't sound that bad."

"Don't mind at all. Wouldn't want Donnie to pounce on ya, now would we? With that fabulous apron _and _the fact that you're covered in food is just-."

"_Go._"

Alex strutted away with a snicker and the next thing April sees is a missing spoon in the bowl of batter.

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**A/N: Oh, Alex, you sly you xD**


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